Why the Queens of Darkness storyline failed

[haliwellmanor]

<p class=”MsoNormal”>Season 4 B was rough. But I would say I was most disappointed by the Queens of Darkness arc. As teased at the end of 4A, they appeared to be a formidable and dangerous threat, but then the writes made numerous questionable choices that soon cast them as no more than slight nuisances. This was down in two major ways.</p>
1.       The writes decided to severely lessen their powers. Maleficent and Ursula should have had Cora level magic AT LEAST. But Ursula couldn’t do any more than find things, or hit people with her tentacles. By far one of the top fan faves, and most powerful in the Disney cannon was reduced to a glorified henchman. We later found it not only was she never meant to be at all similar to her “Little Mermaid” counterpart, but she wasn’t the God they mentioned in Season 3 either.

 

 

 

Maleficent was another lost opportunity. Her Regina friendship origin episode fell flat, we didn’t learn much new about her and again she want from an all-powerful sorcerers to a woman’s whose only power was to turn into a Dragon.   It was also really nebulous to me how she went from supporting Rumple to being on the side of the heroes, the switch motivation was much less explicitly spelled out than the other two.

 

2.        The writers gave them so little to do, so we as the audience didn’t really care about them. There were several times where I said aloud, oh that’s right Maleficent is in town! Then they would switch things up give them an origin episode, make them interesting, make us care about them, this was especially true in the case of Cruella, and then kill them or send them away. They ultimately mattered so little, that two out of three of them weren’t even mentioned in the finale, and Maleficent was nowhere to be seen. I’m just really let down by what was such a promising set up.

 

I know people had mixed feelings about 4A, but I would say Ingrid was one my favorite characters, in part because we got to know her so well. I hope they do better next season with the villains.

[RumplesGirl]

The QoD, at the end of the day, were place holders until the Author could be released in order to start the ramp up to AU-ville. Mal was the most developed but even then, her importance was about her daughter, not really herself.

"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"

[Keb]

I’m going to blame the QoD failure on not using all their assets. Will, Robin, Aurora, Regina–all had history with Maleficent. But even in the rare cases they interacted, they rarely acknowledged those histories (with the exception of Aurora, whose backstory didn’t even work with the S2 version we got). By not tying together the QoD with the loose ends from previous seasons (and Wonderland), they seriously dropped the ball and reduced them to plot devices instead of continuous characters.

And here I’m talking about Mal who actually got treated as relevant in the larger scheme of things…Cruella wound up being our comedic relief for most of her scenes, while Ursula left so fast for her happy ending that I got whiplash. Ursula, too, could have been much stronger if they’d tied her better to her history. They had Ursula and Ariel in the same episode and never had them interact (and yes, they established that there are at least two Ursulas, fine, it still would have been rewarding to see Ariel and Ursula together). That’s seriously letting their fans down and seriously not using the treasures they have RIGHT THERE ON HAND to build their world.

I realize that the realities of filming this show and actors’ schedules sometimes make things difficult, but as they’ve proven time and again, they can still acknowledge these relationships and ties in dialogue even if they can’t/won’t include the characters physically. This show so often feels like missed opportunities for something great (like…you set up everything down to the blocking for a Beauty and the Beast TLK and then have…the apprentice suck out the darkness?) that never happens. Almost every episode since S2 began I’ve been going that was awesome but why didn’t they X? (Why didn’t they take Belle to Neverland, why didn’t they give Neal a chance to be the father he wanted to be, why didn’t they give Henry something to do…etc)

I’m in love with the characters and I want to see them grow and be affected by their pasts. That’s what we saw happening in S1 and the early parts of S2, before Neverland Fever took over. That’s the biggest advantage of a format that expressly explores past/alternative lives for the characters: We get to see what is most true about them, who they truly are.

So I’ll just stop writing by saying it would have all been better with more Belle.

Keeper of Belle's Gold magic, sand dollar, cloaks, purple FTL outfit, spell scroll, library key, copy of Romeo and Juliet, and cry-muffling pillow, Rumple's doll, overcoat, and strength, and The Timeline. My spreadsheet: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6r8CySCCWd9R0RUNm4xR3RhMEU/view?usp=sharing

[WickedRegal]

Adam and Eddy had one job….ONE JOB TO GIVE US THIS SCENE!

But they blew it….even if it wasn’t a poker game, at least give us more than just a car ride! At least show us the drinking and partying All FOUR of the Queens of Darkness had that night! But time limit, I know, but still…These four ladies together was every Disney Fan dream come true, and it was only for one freaking episode!!!!!!!!!!! “Flips A Table”

"If you go as far as you can see...you will then see enough to go even further." - Finn Balor

[Author]

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